


Carnivore

by Kireijo



Category: Psych
Genre: Angst, Gen, Temporary Amnesia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-01
Updated: 2014-10-01
Packaged: 2018-02-19 10:42:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2385440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kireijo/pseuds/Kireijo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was written for the PsychFic Secret Santa Debacle of 2013.  I never posted it on my own page at PsychFic but I'm posting it here now.  </p><p>A fic for Wallflower.<br/>(Set after No Country For Two Old Men)</p>
    </blockquote>





	Carnivore

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the PsychFic Secret Santa Debacle of 2013. I never posted it on my own page at PsychFic but I'm posting it here now. 
> 
> A fic for Wallflower.  
> (Set after No Country For Two Old Men)

“How long does it take to change for dinner. Damn it, Shawn!”

Henry laid on the horn, a window-rattling honk that would have frightened the neighbors if Shawn and Juliet had any. Their new split-level home sat isolated in the hills above Santa Barbara. He still couldn't wrap his brain around the concept of his son settling down with someone, let alone the beautiful, practical and professional Detective Juliet O'Hara. But if the Great Mexican Fiasco of 2013, as his adventure last week with Juliet's step-father Lloyd French would forever be known, couldn't dampen Shawn and Juliet's love for each other, then it must be the real deal, he thought.

Lately Henry had even begun to hope for grandchildren before he died – many, many years from now. But that dream might never come true if Shawn stood up his future in-laws on their last night in town

When a second series of obnoxious honks failed to bring his son outside, Henry slammed a fist down on the dash, cursed at the pain and stupidity of expecting more of Shawn, and got out of the truck. No matter what state Shawn's precious hair was in, Henry would drag him kicking and screaming to the restaurant if he had to. His future grandchildren depended on him to make sure the idiot didn't screw this up.

“Can't even pay your own cell phone bill on time, how will you ever handle a wife and children,” Henry muttered as he stalked past Shawn's motorcycle in the driveway. He couldn't wait until the kid traded it in for something more practical. A not-so-subtle hint dropped at dinner tonight might finally get the ball rolling on that subject at least.

Preoccupied with his ongoing plans to mold Shawn into a better human being, Henry trotted up the walkway, ready to pound on the door until his son came out. But the door stood ajar.

“What the heck?” Henry pushed inside and took the steps down toward the bedrooms where a light at the end of the dark hallway betrayed Shawn's presence. “Shawn, you'd better be dressed and ready to go. We're already late. And the next time you want me to drive you anywhere, you can just forget- Oh for pity's sake!”

He had rounded the corner into their bedroom, only to discover his son sound asleep on the queen-sized bed, sprawled out and drooling all over his girlfriend's favorite plum-colored afghan.

“Wake up, Shawn!” Henry bellowed in a voice he hadn't used since the kid's high school days. “I mean it. Shake a leg!” When Shawn didn't stir, Henry grabbed his ankle and literally shook his leg for him. “Come on, get up. We're late.”

A soft gasp broke free from Shawn's lips. His brow furrowed, but he didn't move. And his eyes remained stubbornly shut.

“This is ridiculous, Shawn,” Henry groused. “Did you binge on Red Vines and Mountain Dew again? Last time you crashed for twenty hours straight, and I do not have time for that.”

The kid had always been a heavy sleeper, God knew, but not this heavy. He hadn't moved an inch or made a single noise apart from that one little gasp. Not until that moment of realization did Henry consider that something might actually be wrong with his son.

“Hey, are you sick or something?” He leaned over his sleeping son, putting one hand on the bed to steady himself while with the other he felt Shawn's forehead for a temperature. His skin felt warm and damp. A fever? And he hadn't even flinched at the touch. Henry's worry amped up as he swept his hand lightly thru Shawn's thick, dark hair.

Encountering warmth and wetness, at the same moment he noticed the coppery smell, he pulled his hand away to find blood on his fingertips. That coupled with Shawn's very audible groan gave him the answer to this mystery, an answer that made his blood pressure spike. Someone had attacked his boy, struck him from behind in his own bedroom. Was this a burglary gone wrong? A home invasion?

Cop reflex took over. Henry had his phone out and dialing before conscious thought told him that he needed to do just that, just as cop instinct made him freeze at the touch of cold metal against the back of his head.”

“Nine one one, what is your emergency?” a voice announced as the line connected.

“Give me the phone,” a gravelly voice spoke softly into his ear. “Say anything and you're dead.”

“This is the nine one one operator. Please state your emergency.”

When Henry hesitated the gun dug deeper into his scalp. Without a word, he passed the phone back over his shoulder while his eyes darted around the room looking for angles and options, anything to save his son. A mirror on the closet door caught his eye. If he leaned forward just an inch or two, he'd be able to see the intruder, maybe find a weakness.

Before he could even shift his weight, the mirror shattered under the impact of Henry's phone, which itself splintered, bits of it scattering across the floor. Shawn groaned and began to stir, slowly curling in on himself as his face contorted with pain. Henry laid a steadying hand on his shoulder.

“Stay still, Shawn.” He didn't know if his son could hear him in his current condition. But the intruder didn't seem to care.

“Where is the bottle?” he demanded.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Henry said evenly. “There's a wine rack upstairs full of bottles, if that's what you're looking for.”

Pain flared through his head as the gun jerked forward. He almost fell on top of Shawn, but kept his balance on the bed. The awkward motion at least provided him cover as he slipped his old Swiss from his son's back pocket. If his recent brush with death taught him anything, it was to not just stand there and get shot. He planned to fight back.

“Dad? What's hap...?” Shawn gasped, his eyes still closed. “What're... you doin' here?”

“The bottle! Give it to me now or I shoot you both.”

“I swear, I don't know anything about a bottle. Please let me help my son.” Henry tensed as he extended the longest blade with one hand, ready to make his move. He just needed a distraction.

Shawn provided it by suddenly convulsing. “'m sick,” he groaned as he started to heave. Now fatherly instinct kicked in. Henry dropped the knife to wrap his arms around his son's shoulders, supporting him above the bed to keep him from aspirating his own vomit. Pounding footsteps fading away behind him told him the intruder had opted to run instead of committing a double homicide. Or maybe he just felt squeamish.

Either way, thank God for small mercies, Henry thought.

Just then Shawn went limp in his arms. “Shawn? Don't do this to me, kid. Hang on!” He eased his son off the bed and down onto the floor and quickly laid him in recovery position. Then he flew to the other side of the bed to pick up the pieces of his cell phone. The back cover had cracked and the battery had separated but the phone was otherwise intact. He quickly reassembled it, powered the phone on and dialed nine one one again.

“This is Henry Spencer. My son's been injured. He's a consultant with the police department, and he's not conscious. I need a bus asap.”

“What is your location?”

Henry rattled off the address and every other piece of information the operator asked for, but once Shawn began to stir, he dropped the phone and focused on his son. “Shawn, I need you to stay awake. Can you do that?”

“Tryin,” Shawn mumbled, his whole body trembling with the effort. “What...”

“Happened?” Henry finished for him. “I was hoping you could tell me. Who did this to you, kid? And what did he want? What bottle?”

The panting breaths alarmed Henry as once again his son struggled to sit up. “Where'm I?”

“We're at your house, you're safe now. He's gone. But what did he want, Shawn? Who was he?” He needed Shawn to focus on something to keep him conscious, and getting any information on the intruder seemed the best way to do it. “Is this about some case?”

Wincing as he shook his head, Shawn's gaze darted everywhere around the room but settled on nothing. “This is... my place? Oh, my head,” he gasped, crumpling back onto the carpet. Only the sound of sirens approaching kept Henry centered and calm enough to do the same for his son.

“Shawn, breathe. Focus on breathing and just stay awake for me. Did he say anything to you? Did you see his face?”

Shawn panted heavily as he looked up from the fetal position he'd curled himself into. Dazed hazel eyes finally focused on Henry. “Car-, carni... ” Shawn whispered, his voice trailing off as his eyes lost focus.

Henry cupped his face with both hands, gently guiding him until their eyes locked once more. “Say it again, Shawn. What are you trying to say?”

“Carnivore,” he repeated loud and clear this time, though pain colored his voice. Before Henry could find out what that word meant, Shawn's eyelashes fluttered rapidly, his eyes rolled back and he lost consciousness again.

 

“Are you sure he said 'carnivore'?” Lassiter asked, putting air quotes around the word. “Maybe what he really said was carnival. Or cannibal. No? What about cannabis? Maybe he just wanted some reefer.”

Henry was saved from a criminal charge of assaulting an officer when Karen handed Lassiter the audio-visual equivalent of a slap in the face. “Carlton, stop it! You are not helping,” she said, with that disapproving look she usually reserved for Shawn and Gus.

“I want to help, Chief. But I don't have much to work with here. Carnivore – what's that supposed to mean? The perp prefers meat? Not helpful. On the other hand, carnies are some of the scariest people I've ever seen.” Lassiter shuddered a bit, then added as almost an afterthought. “And cannibals are also scary.”

“True, though even more unlikely than carnival workers, Detective. Would you like to add clowns to the list? We all know how you feel about them.”

Henry chuckled softly at Karen's comeback, smiling for the first time in days. Three days since Shawn had been brought in by ambulance. Three days since he'd last opened his eyes.

Because the blow to his head struck so close to the brain stem, his doctors had decided to keep him in a medically induced coma until the swelling went down sufficiently. Though they couldn't visit for more than an hour a day and only one person at a time, they'd all taken turns keeping vigil here at the hospital. Henry had told Madeleine that it wasn't a serious injury – no need to fly back from her vacation in Moscow, the one she'd postponed to take care of Henry just a few months prior. This morning he'd almost broken down, almost called her to come home.

But that was before Doctor McCormick pronounced Shawn out of the woods. He had even woken up briefly in the ICU, long enough for them to upgrade him to fair and discharge him from the ICU to the ward. A great weight had lifted, and Henry felt like he could breathe again. The news passed quickly, and once again Shawn's friends and family had gathered at the hospital.

“Any hits on the prison database?” Henry interjected. The detective shook his head. “No hits on area felons, prisoners, pot heads or tattoo parlors either.”

“Tattoo parlors?”

Lassiter shrugged. “Well, I thought maybe the perp had a tattoo that Shawn saw before he was attacked. The word 'carnivore' or a picture of some kind of carnivorous beast. Dobson and McNabb have their hands full, so I looked into it myself. But I came up empty.”

Even if it hadn't turned up anything, Henry was impressed that Lassiter had thought of and pursued that angle. “Thanks for trying, Carlton. Where do we stand on the bottle clue?”

Karen sighed “With Detective O'Hara's help, we've collected every bottle in the home. From travel-sized shampoo bottles to a plastic bank shaped like a giant Coke bottle, and everything in between. Medications, cleaning products....”

“Wine?” Henry knew how much Shawn and Juliet loved their wines. They had received quite a few bottles as housewarming presents just over a week ago.

“Naturally,” said Karen. “But nothing seems significant. Certainly not worth burglary and attempted murder.”

With the memory of that party, Henry had suddenly begun to form a possible idea on motive, but before he could voice it, a shout from down the hallway got his attention.

“Henry!” Juliet O'Hara came flying down the corridor toward them. Last night she had stayed by Shawn's side until nearly dawn, before Gus had come to relieve her watch. She crashed at Henry's house as usual, since her own home had been taped off as a crime scene. Though he'd offered her the guest room, Juliet had insisted on sleeping in Shawn's old bedroom, so she could feel closer to him. “I just got your message. Is it true? Is Shawn awake?”

He welcomed her with a warm hug as he answered. “He's out of danger but he's not awake yet. They're dialing back on his medications slowly, hoping he'll come around in an hour or so.”

“Oh, thank God.”

“Why don't you two go in and keep Gus company for a little while,” Henry suggested to Karen and Carlton. “Juliet, how about I buy you a coffee.”

If anybody thought that Henry had an ulterior motive for getting Juliet alone to talk, they didn't question him. Juliet must have suspected but she didn't press until after they'd gotten their coffees, plus a couple of sweet rolls, and found a quiet table in the corner to sit down and eat. She didn't waste any more time.

“There's no way you'd be here drinking coffee with me instead of sitting upstairs with Shawn right now, unless you had a darned good reason. What's going on, Henry? Is it Shawn? Is he... really okay?”

“Really, Juliet. His last brain scans impressed Doc McCormick. Of course, we won't know for sure how he'll be until he wakes up, but he knew me. Back at the house that day, he seemed confused, but he recognized me. Besides, if I know my son, he'll keep us all waiting for hours before he decides to wake up. There's no rush.”

“Then why?”

Henry hesitated, sipping his coffee to stall while he ordered his thoughts. He couldn't just blurt out an accusation. Not to his maybe-future-daughter-in-law. This required tact, which Henry had in short supply. “It's about Lloyd,” he began hesitantly.

Like the wonderful detective she was, Juliet immediately worked through his line of thinking. “Lloyd? What does he have to do with this? Unless you mean... Oh no, I remember! He and my mom brought three bottles of wine for the party. And Lloyd, he means well but thanks to his gambling problem, he does tend to associate with people who don't mean well at all. Whoever he got the wine from, maybe they want it back. But we went through all three bottles that day! The empties will be in the recycling bin in the garage... We never checked the bin! Oh my goodness, I have to call the officers on duty and have them bring those bottles in to forensics!”

That went a lot smoother then Henry thought it would. Patting her free hand, the one not suddenly grabbing for her cell, Henry stood. “I'll see you upstairs in a few minutes?”

She nodded up at him with a slight smile before her face grew distant. “This is Detective O'Hara,” she spoke into her phone. “Put me through to Dobson.”

Leaving her to her job, though technically she shouldn't even be working on the case, Henry grabbed his coffee and headed back up to Shawn's room.

 

Contrary as ever to all of Henry's expectations for the kid, Shawn woke up before his return. Everyone had been shooed out into the hallway while the on-call doctor examined him, Karen informed Henry. She took the opportunity to say her goodbyes and head back to the station. Impatient to finally take Shawn's statement on the home invasion and attack, Lassiter excused himself with a non-verbal grunt. He muttered something about commodores and cardinals as he headed off in the general direction of the coffee machine. That left Gus.

Leaning against the wall, his head tipped back and eyes glued to the ceiling, he seemed oblivious to Henry's approach. The past few days had been hard on all of them, but he thought that Gus felt it most of all. He seemed completely lost without Shawn. Rachael, his new and entirely too good for him girlfriend, had her hands full with a her son Max who had come down with chicken pox. Not wanting to burden her with his troubles when she had enough problems of her own, he never talked about it when she called. In fact, Henry was pretty sure that Gus hadn't told her a thing about the attack, pretending to be out on a sales run every time she called.

“Gus, thanks for spreading the word this morning. I know you've been here since dawn, and I appreciate that. How was he when he woke up just now? Gus?”

The young man had been completely zoned out but he seemed to gather himself. “Oh, hey Mr. Spencer. He's fine. I think. He recognized everybody. But...”

“Did he say anything?”

Gus shook his head, his eyes glazing over again for a moment before he answered. “It's more what he didn't say.”

“You know him better than anyone, me included.” Henry put a steadying hand on Gus's shoulder and squeezed, trying to help him focus. “Tell me what he didn't say.”

“Nothing. I mean... He was just confused, I guess.”

'Nothing' was not an acceptable answer. But before Henry could press for a better explanation, the door to Shawn's room opened. Now maybe he could get some answers, Henry thought as he turned on the young woman in the white coat who emerged.

“Doctor,” he read the name on her badge, “Hartling, how is my son?”

“Shawn is doing remarkably well, all things considered, Mr. Spencer. Because we medically induced the coma to reduce brain swelling, his chance of complete recovery is very high and he tested well. He's understandably weak, but his speech and fine motor skills are intact. He is exhibiting several signs of post-traumatic amnesia, very common after injuries like his. He's agitated, confused, aggressive at times. And his attention will wander.”

“His attention has always wandered, Doc. I'm not sure that's a valid symptom,” Henry joked. “But, amnesia?”

She smiled. “It's not like amnesia in the movies and on TV. He knows quite a bit, but there are holes. His memory should return in time. Be patient with him and he should fully recover within a few weeks.”

Juliet arrived in the middle of this speech, looking very grave. “Can we see him now?” she asked.

“Certainly. But rest is critical for Shawn. I'm limiting your visit to fifteen more minutes, and then he'll need to rest. Tomorrow we'll know more. In the meantime I'll let your regular physician Doctor McCormick know my findings.”

“Thank you, Doctor,” Juliet said. “I just have a couple questions.”

“Me too,” said Gus, finally joining in.

While the doctor caught them up on what they'd missed, Henry pushed on into the room, anxious to see his son. As he entered, Shawn visibly jumped, while he dropped one hand to his side. Henry felt certain he'd just hidden something under his left thigh, but he didn't call him on it, just happy to see the kid awake.

“Hey, Shawn. How are you feeling?”

“Like the Santa Barbara Seagulls have been using my brain for batting practice. Thanks for asking.”

“That bad, huh.” He reached down and squeezed Shawn's foot beneath the blanket. It reminded him painfully of his 'shake a leg' moment three days ago when he'd been more concerned about making a dinner reservation than his own's son. He cleared his throat. “The Chief had to leave, but Gus and Juliet will be in in a minute. And Lassiter wants to ask you a couple questions, if you're up for it.”

Shawn rolled his eyes and heaved a sigh, already looking tired. “I don't know, Dad.”

“Ten minutes tops, I promise.”

“You promise? That's a joke.” Shawn smirked. Was this a sign of the aggressive behavior Doctor Hartling had mentioned? “Besides, my head feels like the Santa Barbara Seagulls have been-”

“Using your brain for batting practice, you just said that, kid.”

“Doesn't make it any less true,” Shawn shot back, his voice rising as his expression clouded with anger. Agitated and confused, just as the doctor had said. “No Lassiter.”

“No Lassiter,” Henry agreed, hoping to calm Shawn back down again.

“Gus can come in, but not Juliet. Not yet.”

Henry nodded again calmly, though inside he felt the shock of Shawn's words. Why would he not want to see his girlfriend, the love of his life? “I'll let everyone know,” he said as he turned back to the door.

Too late. All three of them entered the room at once and circled Shawn's bed like planets taking up orbit around their sun – his son – he thought. Juliet hovered close, like Venus. Gus stood even closer, like Mercury. And Lassiter took up position well away from him at the foot of the bed, like distant Pluto, which was still a planet in Henry's book, and in Gus's too for that matter. That makes me Mars, he thought, relatively speaking. His position gave him a good view of what happened next.  
“Hi Shawn,” Juliet said hesitantly. She didn't have the best bedside manner, as Henry witnessed back when Shawn had appendicitis, but she took his hand in hers and smiled down at him. “I've got bad news.”

Shawn looked up at her questioningly.

“They had to shave a patch of hair off the back of your head to stitch your wound.” She quirked her head to one side as she smiled crookedly at him. “Sorry.”

“My hair?” Shawn brought his free hand up and tentatively felt around the bandage that wrapped his head. Then he patted the top where his dark hair stuck out in unruly clumps.. “At least they didn't shave all of it. And it'll grow back. Right? It will grow back, won't it? Do I need a hair transplant? Gus? Will you donate your hair for me?”

“Uh, your hair will grow back, Shawn,” Gus said. “But I'd rather donate my hair than my appendix, so sure. You can have some if you need it.”

“Thanks, buddy,” Shawn said as the two men shared a traditional fist bump.

“I'm glad you're okay,” Juliet said, as she cautiously touched the bandage above his forehead and traced it back to lightly ruffle his hair. “And I'm glad you've still got your hair, though it wouldn't make me love you any less.”

“Me, too,” he replied, though he couldn't seem to look her directly in the eyes. “I have a headache.”

“I'm sorry.” She leaned over and kissed his bandaged forehead, and he blushed.

“Hey, Shawn,” said Gus. “The doc said we couldn't stay with you much longer, so I'll let you rest and come see you tomorrow. But um... have you seen my phone? I think I left it in here when she came to examine you.”

“Haven't seen it. Check over by the desk?”

Gus nodded and left orbit to hunt for his cell. That left Lassiter. Shawn had made his feelings very clear on that subject. But Henry wanted answers just as badly as Lassiter did. Even more so. He'd let the detective ask one or two questions before kicking him out. It couldn't hurt.

“Spencer.”

“Lassiter.”

Henry rolled his eyes. Both men seemed to have forgotten that they actually got along from time to time. “Detective, you wanted to ask Shawn something,” he prodded.

Lassiter straightened up and pulled out a small notepad and pencil, old school as ever. “When your father discovered you and asked you who was responsible, you apparently said one word. What was it?”

“Didn't he tell you what I said?”

“He did, but I need you to tell me.”

“Is this some kind of guessing game? Was it 'bite me'?”

Lassiter quirked an eyebrow and refrained from writing the words 'bite me' in his notebook. “No.”

“Then I probably said the word 'carnivore'. But don't ask me what that means. I don't know. It's just there, okay?”

“Okay.” Lassiter didn't look happy with the answer, but he wrote it down anyway. “Do you have any recollection of who attacked you or why?”

“No.” Shawn folded his arms across his chest, stubbornly matching Lassiter's pose.

“Your spirits don't have anything to say on the subject?”

Henry tensed. What if one of the holes in Shawn's memory involved Psych? But he didn't need to worry. “The spirits want you to bite me, too,” said Shawn. “They also want you to take a long walk off a short pier.”

“Carlton, he's suffering from brain trauma,” Juliet said, stepping in. “He's not himself right now. Give him time.”

Lassiter ground his teeth together audibly, as if he was physically trying to lock down any kind of retort. He turned his attention to Henry. “I can see that any questioning would be futile right now. Call me tomorrow if Shawn's feeling more talkative or remembers more.”

“Of course. Let me know if you turn up anything else.”

“I should go, too. I'll see you tomorrow, Shawn.” Juliet followed Lassiter to the door and waved back at him.

“Looking forward to it,” he replied with a smile and a wave. But underneath the blanket, Henry saw how his right leg jiggled with nervous energy as the two detectives left the room.

“Any luck with the phone?” Shawn asked.

Gus had moved his search to the couch by the window, frantically feeling between every cushion with a look of pure disgust on his face. Whatever he found down those cracks, it wasn't his phone.

“You need a hand?” Henry offered.

“Found it!” Henry and Gus both turned in unison to find Shawn holding up the company cell phone that Gus loved almost as much as his precious company car. “It was underneath my cup on this wheeled table thingy.”

He pointed to the spot where Henry was sure there had never been a phone. Then he yawned wide enough to make his jaw crack. He rubbed at his eyes and blinked heavily. “Okay, I think... I think I'm calling it a day. Or hour. Or whatever. Do you mind?”

“Of course not,” said Gus as he happily reclaimed his phone and started checking for messages from Rachael. “We'll see you in the morning. Goodnight Shawn.”

“Goodnight, kiddo,” Henry echoed. He stood in the doorway and turned down the lights. Shawn didn't answer him, already drifting off to sleep. Now Henry understood what Gus had meant about the things Shawn didn't say. Hopefully tomorrow and subsequent days would bring his son a little bit closer to his old self.

 

Each day the visiting time grew longer. And each day Shawn seemed to remember more and more. He warmed up to Juliet after that first rather cold start. And his personality seemed to have a bit of its usual spark back, though he continued to be more reserved, more content to sit back and let others do the talking. He'd let Gus and Juliet go on for hours if the nurses would let them stay that long. But the day of the attack remained a huge blank spot for Shawn, and Henry could tell how much that bothered him when he finally gave his official, very brief statement to Detective Lassiter.

“Look, Lassie. All I've got is that one word. I don't know what it means or why it's in my head. I can't see it,” he said as he waggled his fingers to his temples. “I can't sense it. I can't even hear it. It's just there. Carnivore.”

“Alright Spencer, fair enough. But what about the bottle?”

“What bottle?”

“That's what we'd like to know. According to Henry, the perp said 'give me the bottle'. Do you have any idea what bottle he might have been after?”

“Bottle of good scotch?”

Henry snorted at that, but kept his eyes on the magazine he pretended to read in the corner. Gus laughed too, but not at that. He was too absorbed in trading texts with Rachael to notice anything else. With Shawn and Max both feeling better, the couple could focus on their relationship again.

“I don't know anything about any bottle,” said Shawn. “I barely even remember my own address.”

“It's twenty-eight twelve Mountain Drive,” Juliet spoke up from the doorway as she breezed in with Shawn and Gus's lunch order in her arms.”

“Thanks, sweetie,” Shawn said, accepting a mammoth foiled-wrapped burrito from her while she handed off a second to Gus, who definitely noticed the arrival of food. She claimed a third for herself and took her usual seat beside him. “Are we done, Lassie?”

Lassiter flipped the notebook shut. “Yes, we're done. Enjoy your lunch. Henry, can I talk to you out in the hallway?”

“Sure.” He set his magazine aside, gave Shawn a pat on the leg, and then headed out to join the detective a few yards down the hall. “I hope you've got good news.”

“Not even close. The physical evidence collected from the house didn't match to anybody currently in our system so there's no way to ID him from that, and results from the national database could take months to come in. There are no traffic cameras in the area, and most security camera footage from the neighbors doesn't show the road.”

Henry connected the dots. “So that's it. We're out of options.”

Lassiter reluctantly nodded. “For now. We're going to keep looking. Keep canvasing the area until we get a hit. Progress on examining bottles we collected has been slow but steady. But O'Hara's anxious to get back to the house. She wants to get it ready for when Shawn gets released, but as long as that nut-job who attacked the two of you is in the wind, I think it's a bad idea to stay there.”

“Agreed,” said Henry. “They can stay with me at my house for the duration.” Though Shawn won't like it, Henry thought as he went back into the room to tell them.

“Bad news, kids,” he said as he took a seat on the edge of his son's bed to address both Shawn and Juliet at once. “Looks like the two of you will be staying with me once Shawn is released in a couple days. They'll let you back into your house to pick up some clothes, but it's off limits at least for another week or two.”

“But it's our house!” Juliet protested. “We've barely gotten to live there and now we're evicted?”

“Consider it a vacation stay at a B and B, complete with home cooked breakfasts every morning. Bacon and eggs, pancakes, whatever you like.”

“Did somebody say pancakes?” Gus asked around a mouthful of burrito.

Henry just shook his head and focused on the couple in question. “Now that I'm re-retired, I could use the company. You can take the guest room which is much bigger than Shawn's old bedroom and has its own bathroom. And Shawn, I promise I won't barge in on you and Juliet the way you did on me and your mother.”

Juliet shivered at the thought, but Shawn only looked confused. “You and Mom?”

“Yes, don't you remember?” He had to remember. Shawn had been completely traumatized. “But really, nobody asked you to babysit me while I recovered. Maddie enjoyed taking care of me, all on her own.”

“Recovered,” Shawn repeated. “Right. From...”

“Being shot?” Henry slipped off the bed and stood up. “Shawn, is this another one of your memory holes? You don't remember anything about me getting shot, or you going rogue to catch the people responsible?”

“Sure, I remember,” Shawn insisted. “Bits and pieces. I just need you to fill in the whole picture.”

He'd used that line before, Henry thought. They would start talking about some case or another, and Shawn would claim he only had bits and pieces, like a puzzle. He only needed his family and friends to give him a narrative so he could see how everything fit together. They'd been only too happy to oblige. But now Henry wondered just how much of his memory Shawn had lost.

“You don't remember anything about your mother coming to visit?”

“Sure, of course I do.” He squirmed a little, eyes darting around the room before they landed on Gus. “I told Gus all about it. Didn't I, Gus?”

“You sure did. You wouldn't shut up about it. And Jules was all mad because you chose to move in with your parents instead of moving in with her. If it wasn't for that serial killer, and you seeing your parents having sex, I think you'd still be living with them.”

Henry listened to Gus's narrative, but he focused on Shawn. The kid might think he was subtle, getting Gus to answer the question instead of answering for himself. But Henry didn't buy it any more. He saw the way Shawn's eyes widened at the mention of sex.

“Yeah, thank God for serial killers. Isn't that right, Jules?”

“I almost died, Shawn,” Juliet countered. “And wow, I think this is the first time you've called me Jules since you've been in here. I almost thought you'd forgotten.”

It all made sense now, Henry realized. Shawn had never called her Jules, because no one else had called her that until Gus did just a minute ago. And so many of the things he supposedly remembered about the date and current events could have easily been gleaned from Gus's phone, which Shawn must have stolen and accessed on the very first day he woke up. He was running a con, making them all believe he remembered when the amnesia was really much worse than they suspected.

“He did forget,” Henry said.

“I did not,” Shawn insisted, but he didn't fool Henry.

“I hope you haven't fogotten the first time you and Juliet kissed either. Why don't you tell us all about that?”

Shawn looked away, his mouth working though no words came out at first. He looked to Gus for help, but Henry knew that Gus had never gotten the details. He'd quizzed Gus about their relationship once it became public knowledge, but the young man had been kept just as in the dark about their couple status as everyone else.

Looking to Juliet next, Shawn said, “That's something between Jules and I.”

“You can at least tell us where you were. I don't need all the details, just a location.”

Shawn shook his head firmly, then winced, still suffering from the after-effects of his head injury. “Private.”

“How about the second time you kissed? Is that private, too?”

“All of it's private,” Shawn insisted, his forehead furrowed with anger. “Geez, I didn't expect a spanish inquisition.”

“Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition,” Gus cut in with a fake accent, making Shawn smile. “Our chief weapon is surprise. Surprise and fear. Fear and surprise. Our two weapons are-”

“Gus, now is not the time!” Henry bellowed. Almost instantly, a nurse appeared in the doorway, raised a finger to her lips and gave him a stern look. “Sorry,” he said quietly. She disappeared and he returned his attention to his son.

But Juliet beat him to the next question. “Do you remember when we first met, Shawn?”

“Absolutely.”

She looked at him expectantly. “Go on, tell me what happened.”

“This is ridiculous. I remember, of course I remember, sweetheart. How could I ever forget the most important day of my life. When you walked into the room, the moment I saw you I knew.”

“What room?” Henry asked.

But Juliet stood up suddenly. One hand covered her mouth as she stared at him in shocked disbelief. “Shawn. You walked into the room. Not me.”

“What room?” Henry pressed for an answer.

Shawn shot him a dirty look before answering Juliet first. “Of course, that's what I meant. I walked into the room and saw you, and I just knew you were special. Prettiest detective at the station.”

“You don't remember me at all, do you?”

“Jules, please. Head injury, remember? I've got bits and pieces. They get out of order and scrambled, but I've got them.”

“What about my father? You remember him, don't you?”

“Sure I do. Lloyd stopped by yesterday.”

“Lloyd is my step-father, Shawn. His last name is French. I'm talking about my real father, Frank O'Hara. You and he got along rather well, remember?” Shawn nodded. “Then tell me what he does for a living.”

Shawn dropped his head and squeezed his eyes shut for a second. “Can we not do this right now? It's giving me a headache.”

“Just tell her what he does,” said Henry. “It's simple. If you can't remember that, then tell me about Allison Crawley, or Adam Hornstock, or Pierre Despereaux, or Jerry Carp. Tell us anything you remember about any of them, Shawn. You say you've got bits and pieces. Just give us one.”

“Come on, Shawn,” Gus said. He'd crept up to the foot of the bed, worry etched across his features. “I know you know. You remember Mira, right? Or Marlowe?”

Shawn just shook his head. “Why are you all doing this to me?” He was panting now, and Henry noticed that his heart monitor had sped up. But he had to keep going.

“We just want you to quit lying to us, Shawn. If you don't remember, tell us. We'll understand.”

“I'm not lying! I know who I am. You quit lying!” Shawn threw back the covers and tried to get to his feet as Juliet backed away from his angry outburst. But Henry easily pushed him back down onto the hospital bed

“What are you talking about, Shawn? When have I lied to you?” he asked as calmly as he could.

“Every minute since I woke up. Quit acting like you actually care about me and my life. You helped me out on one stupid case and now we're buddies? And according to you, everything supposed to be okay with Mom now, too. Well, I don't buy that for a second! Why don't you just go back to Miami and stay out of my life.”

Shawn struggled against Henry's grip on his shoulders, but he was still too weak. “Get your damned hands off me! Get out! All of you get out!”

“Mr. Spencer? Visiting time is over. We need you all to leave the room.” Henry reluctantly stood back with Gus and Juliet while three nurses swarmed Shawn's bed and tried to calm and sedate him.

“I know who I am!” Shawn kept shouting. They could hear him all the way down the hall and into the elevator. “I know who I am!”

The elevator doors closed. Silence enveloped them all.

“Why would he lie?” Juliet whispered.

“He didn't want to hurt us,” said Gus. “Especially you.”

But Henry knew the real reason. “He's afraid. Afraid that if he doesn't remember you, Juliet, that you won't want him anymore. That we'll all reject him. He's always been insecure. His head injury just amplified it to the extreme.”

In an instant, Henry found two pairs of arms wrapped around him and each other, two sensitive souls dripping tears on his favorite hawaiian shirt. He hugged them back, tempted to cry right along with them. If Shawn remembered Lassiter and Chief Vick and being a fake psychic, but didn't remember Juliet at all, then by his calculation, his son had lost about six and half years worth of memories. Juliet was heartbroken, and Gus inconsolable. But he had to be strong. If Shawn didn't remember all the fences that had been mended between them over these past few years, Henry would mend them all over again if he had to.

But first he'd do everything in his power to help Shawn regain his memory.

 

Shawn had refused all visitors the next day. Nothing Doctor McCormick could say would convince him otherwise. “Tomorrow I'm sure he'll want to talk to at least one of you,” the doctor told Henry when he, Gus and Juliet all met with him that afternoon. “I'll only release him if it's into the care of one of you three.”

“That'll probably be you, Gus,” said Henry. “All his memories of you are good.”

“And he actually does remember you,” Juliet added with a touch of bitterness in her voice. The fact that Shawn's memories stopped just before they met obviously bothered her.

“His memory should return with time,” Dr. McCormick told them. “Be patient.”

We're all trying to be patient, Henry thought as he waited outside the hospital on the following morning. Gus had arrived in the Blueberry to pick up Shawn about half an hour ago. Even though Shawn still didn't want to see his father, that wouldn't keep Henry from seeing Shawn.

As he watched the main doors, suddenly Gus came flying out of them. He frantically looked all around the parking lot, spotted Henry's truck and took off running toward him. Henry jumped out of the truck to meet him halfway.

“He's gone, Mr. Spencer. Shawn's gone!”

“What do you mean?” For a split second, Henry feared that Shawn had taken a turn for the worse last night. But Gus quickly clarified.

“They say he disguised himself as a doctor somehow and slipped out about an hour before we got here.”

Henry's mind raced through their options. “Contact Lassiter and Juliet, let them know. Then check the Psych office, see if he went there. Call me if you find him. I'm going to check the new house.”

After they split up, Henry turned his truck north toward Mountain Drive. Twenty-eight twelve, the address that Juliet had given Shawn just two days ago, back when they only thought he had a few holes in his memory, not years. It might be a long shot. Shawn tended to stick with the familiar. But then again, Henry had trained him his whole life to be an investigator – to solve the problem, not run away from it.

The house looked empty when he drove up, except for the broken strip of yellow police tape. Someone had been inside and might still be there. And it might not be Shawn. With memories of his last visit to the house still vividly fresh in his head, Henry pulled his revolver from the glove compartment, checked it and tucked it into his waistband. His jacket covered it as he approached the house and slipped through the open doorway.

This time he didn't announce himself to any intruder. Instead he pulled out his gun and held it at the ready as he glided down the stairs to the master bedroom. When he reached the doorway, Henry stole a glance into the room, then tucked his weapon away again and knocked on the doorframe.

“Shawn? Can I come in?”

His son lay face up and spread-eagle on the bare mattress, since the police had collected all the bedding as evidence. Dozens of photographs were scattered all around him. The moment Henry spoke, Shawn rolled over onto his stomach. Tucking his elbows underneath him to prop himself up, he picked up the nearest photo and stared at it intently.

Henry cautiously entered the bedroom and kneeled on the floor a few feet away from Shawn putting them at eye level. He could see the photograph now. Shawn and Juliet kissing on some scenic overlook, with mountains and a body of water behind them. “Hey kid. Was that picture taken in Canada?”

Shawn sighed. “I wish I knew.” He tossed it aside and picked up another, a portrait of Juliet taken for the SBPD Annual Report a couple years ago. “She's beautiful.”

“Yes, she is,” Henry agreed.

“What does she see in me?”

Henry chuckled sadly. “I wish I knew, kid,” he echoed. “But she loves you. And so do I.” There. He'd actually admitted to loving his son, to his face. Sort of.

Shooting him a look of pure skepticism, Shawn replied. “Am I dying?”

“No.”

“Are you dying?”

“No.”

“Dang it!” With one arm, Shawn swept all the other photos onto the floor and flopped facedown on the mattress.

“Shawn,” Henry began, his tone a mild rebuke.

“I'm sorry,” Shawn said quickly, his voice muffled as he spoke into the bed. “Sorry about... back at the hospital. I just thought it would all come back eventually. All I had to do was keep...”

“Keep up the pretense? Shawn, it doesn't matter whether you remember or not. We remember and we all care about you.”

“Even Juliet?”

“Especially Juliet.”

Shawn sighed into the mattress, then turned his head to look at Henry. “It's like, I went to sleep that night, not even eight days after me and Gus started Psych, and woke up in the hospital room. Everybody looked so different, but I didn't work it out at first. Not until I noticed that Chief Vick wasn't pregnant anymore.” He sighed again and rubbed at his eyes. “There's this huge black hole of nothing in between. Nothing. I haven't remembered a single thing on my own. All the stories you and Gus and Juliet have told me, they all sound great, but...”

“But you still don't remember.” Henry met Shawn's eyes evenly. “It doesn't matter if you remember now, or weeks or months from now, or never. We'll get through this.”

Sniffling a little, Shawn propped himself up on his arms again. “You really are different than I remember.”

“How so?”

“I thought you would have given up on me by now.” A tear traced down Shawn's cheek as he admitted that.

Henry blinked back tears of his own when he replied. “Son, I was an idiot back then. I will never give up on you again.”

Shawn wiped at his eyes and sniffled again. “Man, when did I get so weepy?”

“It's the head injury. It can alter your personality.”

“Permanently?”

“Sometimes,” Henry admitted. “Now can we get out of here?”

“Not yet.” Shawn turned around and sat up on the bed as he looked around the room. “I actually came here for a reason, Dad. My memory isn't a complete black hole. There's that one word that connects my life then to what it is now.”

“Carnivore.”

“Carnivore,” Shawn repeated. “Stupid word. What does it even mean?”

“It means a meat eater.”

“Dad, don't be Gus. I know what it means! I just don't know what it's supposed to mean to me, alright? But I remembered one of your lessons from when I was a kid. The rewind button.”

Henry beamed with pride. “I taught you that for how to deconstruct a crime scene. You see how it is, the result of the crime, then mentally rewind bit by bit, logically working backward through out all the steps that led up to the crime. You think you can do that now?”

“I don't know. I was the crime scene this time, so it's hard to imagine it now, like this.” He waved his arms to encompass the room now stripped of all pertinent evidence. “Can you help me?”

“Of course I can. Anything you need.”

Shawn sighed and rubbed at his eyes. Then once again, he flopped facedown on the bed. He looked up just long enough to meet Henry's eye. “Okay, here goes nothing. Put me in the position I was when you first found me.”

Immediately, Henry hated the idea. Even if Shawn remembered something, Henry really didn't want to relive that horrible day. But his son needed this. He took a deep breath and blew it out, then stood and went back to the doorway. “You were lying closer to the right side of the bed, face down with your head turned to the right and your right knee raised.”

Shawn squirmed into a close approximation of the pose. “Like this?”

“Almost. Your left hand was pinned under your body. A little higher and stick the elbow out more. Like that,” he said, as Shawn followed his directions. “Raise your right knee up a little and kick the foot more. Good. And your right hand was even with your eyes about a foot away. A fist, not an open palm. Turn your face into the mattress just a little more. There, that's it.” Shawn now looked almost exactly as Henry found him, except for the lack of bedding. “What now?”

“Now I need you to not say anything or interrupt me in any way until I ask you to, okay?”

“Okay, Shawn. Do what you need to do.” Unless Shawn was in some kind of danger, Henry would keep that promise. He folded his arms across his chest and waited stoically.

“Right, here we go.”

Shawn inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly as he let his eyes close. He lay there for maybe ten minutes while Henry watched over him, his breath evening out to the point where Henry felt sure his son had fallen asleep.

Suddenly he moved. In an instant, Shawn pushed off the mattress and up onto his knees at the edge of the bed, his hands raised above his head like someone behind him with a gun to his head.

Henry straightened up and almost asked if he had remembered something. But when Shawn jumped backward off the bed and onto his feet, he decided to let the kid play this out. He had hit the rewind button on his own life, trying to work backward from the moment he was injured. Trying to spark a memory.

Stepping out of the way, Henry silently trailed as Shawn walked slowly backward through his own home. Now he could see that Shawn's eyes were closed, but he didn't run into anything. He stepped backward through the bedroom door and out into the hall, backward up the stairs to the top level of the home. Backward he walked to the refrigerator, unerringly opening the door without so much as a peek to locate the handle.

Though everything had been removed last week, Shawn took an imaginary swig of milk or juice or some other beverage, then shut the door and moved backward through the kitchen and into the living room again. His helmet sat on a side table in the living room. When Shawn picked it up in his backward walk to the door, Henry determined that he would definitely interrupt this process if Shawn tried to get on that bike and ride it backward out of here.

He silently followed Shawn outside and down the walkway to where his bike sat parked just where he'd left it. But instead of trying to get on the bike, Shawn just hooked the helmet onto the handlebar and kept walking, slowly and steadily backward. Out into the street.

Alarmed at this new and potentially dangerous aspect of the 'rewind button' game, Henry followed closely and kept watch for traffic while his son kept walking, ever backward down the road that would take him into Santa Barbara and eventually back to the station where he'd come from on that fateful day.

Henry had to believe he was remembering at least some of this, not just working it all out logically as he went along. He'd have to put a stop to this soon, Henry knew, but Shawn seemed more excited now. His steps more sure.

They were now more than a hundred yards from the house when Shawn suddenly stopped beside the nearest neighbor's long, winding driveway. With his eyes still closed, he turned his head down that driveway. His eyes flashed open. He shuddered, and immediately collapsed onto his hands and knees on the road.

Henry rushed to his side. “Shawn! Are you alright? Speak to me, kid.”

Shawn gasped and struggled to look up at Henry, his eyes finally fluttering open to blink against the bright morning sunlight. “Dad, we're spelling it wrong.”

“What?”

“Call Lassie,” Shawn said, before he laid down on the blacktop and curled into a ball. “My head hurts.”

“Okay, we'll deal with it, but you can't take a nap in the middle of the road. Let's get you back to the house.” Henry got Shawn to his feet and supported him, somehow managing to call Lassiter to the scene as they went. No sirens, he told them.

They made it as far as the front lawn before Shawn sunk down and curled up again, his arms wrapped around his head protectively. Henry draped his jacket over his son's head to help block out the light that must be contributing to his migraine. Then he returned his weapon to the glove compartment of his truck just as Lassiter, Juliet and Gus all arrived in separate vehicles.

They ran up together but Henry hushed them before they could start asking a million questions. “Lassiter, Shawn wants to tell you something. Keep it quiet. He's got a migraine.”

The detective nodded grimly, then stalked over to the prone man. Henry followed close on his heels. He kneeled beside Shawn and whispered. “Lassiter's here now. What did you want to tell him?”

Shawn lifted the edge of the jacket a couple inches. One hand snuck out from underneath and he used it to gesture Lassiter closer. The detective took a knee. Shawn continued to gesture, closer. He sighed and laid down on the grass in his nice black suit. “If I get grass stains-”

“Shhh,” Henry cut him off. “Go ahead, Shawn.”

Shawn stuck his head out just long enough to spell it out in a whisper. “C. A. R. N. One. V. O. R.” Then he ducked under the jacket again, like a turtle hiding in its shell.

“What the-”

Henry grabbed him by the arm and physically dragged him away from Shawn and back to where the others waited by the car. “It's sounds like a license plate number to me, Detective. Looks like you just got a fresh lead. Now run with it.”

Lassiter's eyes brightened with excitement. “Roger that. Will he be okay?”

“We'll take care of him.”

Once the detective had gone, Henry gathered Juliet and Gus close. “We need to get him back to the hospital,” he whispered.

Twenty feet away, Shawn groaned out. “No hospital! And yes, I can still hear you.”

 

With a lot of patience and effort, the three of them managed to get Shawn back to Henry's house and upstairs to his old bedroom where he'd be most comfortable. Juliet draped blankets over the windows, Gus provided the medication, and Henry brought a cold compress for the back of Shawn's head. He slept the whole day away, woke up just long enough to eat a little chicken noodle soup, and then was out again for the night.

Henry, Gus and Juliet were sitting around the kitchen table the next morning when Shawn came down. Freshly showered and dressed in ratty jeans and a plaid shirt, he looked like himself again. Henry hoped that was a good sign. “Good morning, Shawn.”

“Good morning everybody,” he said, looking rather awkward as he stood on the third step.

“How are you feeling?”

“Much better, thanks to those pills you gave me, Gus. Juliet, can I talk to you upstairs for a minute?”

She glanced uncertainly at both Henry and Gus before she pushed back from the table and met him at the stairs. He held out a hand and she took it shyly as he guided her back up the stairs and out of sight.

Gus looked nervous. “Do you think he remembers?”

“We'll know in a minute,” said Henry. He got up and poured out a few more rounds of pancake batter onto the hot griddle. By the time they had cooked to a golden brown and he flipped them onto a plate, they had an answer.

Juliet and Shawn came back down the stairs together, still hand in hand. But the lovely detective no longer looked so uncertain. She was beaming from ear to ear. “He remembers me,” she announced, tears shining in her eyes. “I need a tissue, excuse me.”

“I need one, too,” Gus said as his sympathy tears kicked in and he hastily followed Juliet into the living room.

“So,” Shawn began as he took a seat at the table and poured maple syrup onto the pancakes Henry put in front of him. “Any luck with the carnivore clue?”

“Yep, and you won't believe it,” said Henry, taking the opposite seat. He passed over the whipped cream. “The perp was after the giant Coke bottle bank.”

Shawn laughed. “You're kidding.”

“Nope. The license plate number you gave Lassiter matched to a vintage dark green Dodge Charger owned by Nestor Young.” Shawn ravenously consumed his pancakes as he listened to Henry's story. “Turns out Gus recognized his home address as one that you two visited during that Rummage-O-Rama event several weeks ago. Nestor has a juvenile record but nothing as an adult. However he does have a considerable gambling addiction. He got in over his head with a loan shark and planned to pay him off with some rare pennies he'd inherited from his grandparents.”

“Pennies? Like the coin show with Frank? They're actually worth something?”

Henry smiled, happy that Shawn truly did have his memories back. “Yes, just like that. The coins were together worth close to ten thousand dollars, enough to put Nestor back in the clear. His girlfriend threw that rummage sale to help raise extra cash for him, never knowing that he'd hid the coins in the stupid bank, taped to the inside of the bottle cap. She recognized you from the news. Then he tracked down your address and went to get his coins back.”

“And the rest is history.” Shawn polished off the last bite of pancake. “I barely remember anything from that day, Dad. But everything else is back. I think.”

“That's good. More pancakes?”

Shawn shook his head slowly, then rubbed at the back of his neck, wincing slightly. “Did they catch Nestor?”

“Lassiter got him. He's in custody. It's safe for you and Juliet to go back home whenever you're ready.”

“Cool,” Shawn said. He pushed back from the table and stood up. “Well, this was delicious. Thank you. But I'd better head back there and try to console the two crybabies. I need one of them to give me a ride to the station so I can thank Lassie and the Chief, and Dobson and Buzz, too.” He stepped backward from the table and kept walking backward until he stood in the short hallway that lead to Henry's living room.

“Are you still pushing the rewind button, Shawn?” Henry asked, confused by his son's behavior.

“Nah, I just remember what you said, when you were helping me yesterday. And I... I wanted to say, for the record...” He took another step back until he was almost completely out of view before he finished in a rush of words. “IloveyoutooDad. Gotta go, bye!”

In ten seconds flat, Shawn had coaxed Gus and Juliet out the door, leaving Henry to deal with the breakfast dishes. But he didn't care. He couldn't stop smiling. The two of them had come so far over the past seven years. It would have been enough to know that he hadn't lost any ground with his son after his head injury, but now he knew that he had gained so much more.

They both had.


End file.
